Multiple Choice Question Example 1

Anthropologists argue that kinship is a form of relatedness because:

A. Some social groups have kinship that is traced through mother-child links while other societies may recognize an equal relatedness through both the mother and father's lineage.

B. There is no common way that societies recognize biological relationships. Instead there is great variation in the relationships that are recognized within different societies; in many societies, family members have no biological connection to each other.

C. Relatedness is about love, and all that is needed to make a family is love.

D. Anthropological research has shown that biology is socially constructed, so no form of biological connection is valid.

Which answer gets full credit?

B.

Why did this answer earn full credit?

It clearly shows that the student understands the anthropological information.
The student draws on knowledge from the course materials. In this case, the student uses information from the textbook and lecture.
Answer A is from Google; while it seems connected, it is not relevant to the question.
Answer C is a nice idea, but it doesn't use anthropological knowledge.
Answer D uses terms from the class like "socially constructed," but anthropologists don't say that biology is socially constructed.

Multiple Choice Question Example 2

Many societies have varied forms of kinship that are not based on biology. For example, in Ju/'hoansi society where there is a limited number of names, everyone with the same name is considered related no matter what the biological relationship may be.

A. This is why anthropologists argue that in all human societies, kinship is tied to the biological relationships created by human reproduction.

B. This is why anthropologists argue that the Ju/'hoansi are a hunter-gatherer society.

C. This is why anthropologists argue kinship is a form of relatedness, not a biological relationship.

D. All of these.

Which answer gets full credit?

C.

Why did this answer earn full credit?

It clearly shows that the student understands the anthropological information.
The student draws on knowledge from the course materials. In this case, the student uses information from the textbook and lecture.
A. is from Google. It is not what I taught in class, nor what our course materials states.
B. doesn't make sense. The Ju/'hoansi are hunter-gatherers, but their naming system and kinship systems have nothing to do with their classification as hunter-gatherers.
Since A. and B. aren't valid, D. isn't a correct answer either.